Chapter 9 – The Strange Phenomena of 'Hell' Mode

Pran was standing at the edge of a deep cave, the stench of rot assaulting his senses. He wrinkled his nose in disgust but pressed on because he still had to clear this lair. As he arrived at the end of the passage, he was at the entrance of a prison-like chamber filled with many humans hanging from the walls. Some were males while some were females. Their clothes seemed to have been torn while they were being tortured, and some were totally naked with bruises and whip marks. The scene made him feel sick to his stomach, and he couldn't help but wonder how they ended up there.

Goblins and even Hobgoblins milled about the cave, chatting, sharpening their weapons, and sleeping, while some of them were eating something. Despite having seen this sight before, and knowing that there will be more thing similar or even worse things he will see in the future, Pran felt nauseated. But then he sensed at least two strong presences at the far end of the other passage, both of whom he would have a hard time fighting even if used all his remaining stats and raised his power to the utmost.

How can there be humans inside the dungeon if I’m the only person to enter it? Could it be that… Pran's thoughts were interrupted by a loud thud that echoed through the cave, sending his heart racing. His danger sense, honed from countless life-and-death situations in his previous life, warned him that one of those two strong enemies was heading in his direction.

Pran quickly moved a few steps back, hiding in the shadows as he waited. With his current strength, not many beings at even level 25 would be able to give him this kind of feeling unless they were from certain strong races that could be encountered in the tower or, at scarce times, in the dungeons that you enter through the portals.

As the source of what was giving him such huge pressure drew closer, Pran prepared to defend himself. Suddenly, what appeared before his sight was a three-meter-tall “Troll”.

"Fuck!" Pran exclaimed in disbelief. "How can there be a Troll in a goblin lair? This makes no sense."

Sure a goblin king is strong, and can subdue hobgoblins, but trolls, never. Trolls are way stronger than even a Hobgoblin king, not to mention a mere Goblin King. This could only mean one thing, the goblin king of this lair is nothing comparable to other king types or is not a goblin but has somehow become a goblin king? Pran’s brain was working at high speed even when he was shocked because of the current situation which was not making any sense to him. Generally, Trolls were known to have goblins as their lackeys, not the other way around.

“Is it because this is ‘Hell’ mode? Can things that are not seen before or not referred to as commonsense be normal phenomena here? If so then I will have to be even more when making my moves.” Suddenly he opened his stats window and was just about to increase his stats points he noticed the troll something on the ground from the corner of his eyes and then heard a low grunt.

Thud!

Instinctively, Pran looked in the direction of the sound and saw a naked female elf lying on the ground, unconscious or possibly dead, after being thrown like a ragdoll.

As Pran was still keeping an eye on the situation, the troll turned and was about to walk away but suddenly stooped and started to sniff the air around it and said something in its deep and guttural voice which Pran couldn’t understand. But he knew instinctively that he has been found because trolls had a very sense of smell and there was no way to hide from that unless you had certain skills or items.

Without wasting any more time Pran used all his remaining stats points and increased his Strength, Endurance, and Agility. Instantly he felt a surge of power within his body and looked at the troll once more who was still sniffing around but now had started to move in his direction with other goblins and hobgoblins following it.

Pran knew that even if he sniped like the last time, he would be able to take out 24 goblins from what seemed to be around 30 goblins, or a few hobgoblins before they were alerted and be on guard and shielding themselves from the arrows, while the troll would just lock onto him and then he would have to engage in melee combat. He wasn’t worried about the melee combat part, but trolls were notorious for their monstrous health & stamina as well as high recovery rate. And if he was not able to deal more damage than it could heal, then it will come down to stamina, and he would lose no matter how strong he was currently.

But it was not like his situation was totally hopeless. After making his calculations he withdrew two arrows from the quiver from his back and loaded them on the compound bow and pulled back the bowstring to the max and aimed both of them at the troll's eyes.

He used this bow and arrow to kill the goblins before but right now he had a feeling that the way he fired arrows back then was rather crude. This feeling was even more refined when he had the “Weapons Master” passive skill and used to shoot arrows, and he instinctively knew how to precisely aim at the troll’s eyes and the right time to fire the arrows so as to not give the troll any chance to dodge them.

It all seemed that it had taken a while to happen but only a few seconds had passed since the troll started sniffing and had only taken two steps in his direction. Just then the troll abruptly let out a loud roar.

ROARR~

Pran instinctively knew that it was the perfect time to let the arrows loose. While the troll had just started to roar, all the hair on its body stood on end as it felt the sensation of extreme danger, and heard a sharp tearing noise in the air rushing toward his head.

SWISH!

Before it had the time to move its hands in front of its face, it saw two sharp metallic points right before its eyes. The troll reflexively closed its eyes, but the arrows still easily pierced both its eyes. Unfortunately, the arrows only moved a little more after puncturing its eyeballs and got stuck in its thick bones, unable to penetrate it further and puncture its brain, otherwise, it would have died on the spot.

And as to why Pran choose not to shoot the arrows at the troll's throat or in its mouth where it would have definitely pierced it and dealt heavy damage. The main point was that he was inside a dungeon of ‘Hell’ mode, and there was something that should not be there, and he had a feeling that the troll in front of him was not so simple. So rather than taking a gamble like that he decided to blind the troll and reduce the goblins’ and hobgoblins' numbers.

SWISH! SWISH! SWISH!

Soon arrows started flying and struck three hobgoblins who were not prepared and pierced their heads exploding like the goblins that had died at Pran's hands before. But that was not it, because some hobgoblins were standing behind those initial hobgoblins so another five of them died, reducing their initial numbers from 23 to 15.

Pran didn’t stop and kept on shooting the arrows while moving all around while mainly targeting the hobgoblins while making sure that if it pierced one hobgoblin it will hit another hobgoblin or at least a goblin that won’t survive even if the hobgoblin survived.

While Pran was wreaking havoc on the goblins and hobgoblins the troll was screaming in pain after pulling out the arrows from its eyes and was furiously stomping around and had inadvertently killed around 10 goblins and 2 hobgoblins. While its eyes were still gone and it still was in pain, the blood gushing out was already showing signs of stopping.

Soon Pran was out of arrows but there were still 4 hobgoblins and around 20 goblins were still remaining. He was not sure how much time he had before the reinforcement would arrive, and unless the battle was over he won’t receive any exp and gold. So he had to finish this battle swiftly. Pran was back on the spot where he had left the sword and shield and let the compound bow and picked those up and rushed into the group of the remaining hobgoblins and goblins.

As he started killing them Pran’s heart started racing once more and his danger sense started going off. As if something was not right where the troll was thrashing, he instinctively moved his eyes toward it and was almost stunned on the spot. What he saw made him curse out loud: “Motherfucker! That’s not a normal troll, that’s a ‘Blood Troll’. No wonder I had felt danger when I first saw it.”

He had only killed 1 hobgoblin and 3 goblins, but gritted his teeth and swiftly moved towards the blood troll. Because if he left the blood troll thrash around like it was doing now then with its innate regeneration coupled with its special trait ‘Blood Absorption’ it will be back to its full fighting strength with even its eyesight back.

If that happens, then Pran would have a low chance of winning against it, and even then he will be close to death. And he didn’t want that right now no matter what, because if that happened, the skill “Unbreakable Spirit” will be triggered and even after killing the blood troll he will be fucked up due to the backlash of the skill, cause then even a goblin grunt will be able to kill him easily.